The Absolute: Humanity's Second Chance

Chapter 158 Project Silver III

How hateful..!!

She cursed, her emotions about to erupt once more. But Adonis did not allow her to do so, as he hurriedly spoke, "The city is mostly managed by the nobles. The positions they hold, make them sturdy pillars of Avarice."

"If we don't do something about it, they will immediately withdraw their influence, thus collapsing the city. In a few weeks, we might..." He sighed, causing Fiona to look up at him with worry.

Yes, worry.

The Strongholds were considered nations, but in truth, were beyond that. Just their cities alone, rivaled modern day nations in terms of population and management.

And even then, having a president did not signify monotheistic rulership over a nation. Cities had mayors, city lords, or government officials governing over them.

It was the same within Strongholds.

Nobles, each ruled a portion of the city, which they would consider their territory. But overally, they still answered to the city lord. Yet only... if said city lord had power over them.

Unfortunately... Adonis did not have such power. And this caused the young Romanian princess to worry for him.

She was worried about him. His mental state. His physical state. She wondered if he could hold up for that, even as a domain lord–

...!!!

Wait, domain lord... they were domain lords, beings leagues above others. Even without taking into account their status as royalty, just being domain lords alone should be enough.

Fiona had such a realization.

"Wait..!!" Her thoughts reaching an apex point, she subconsciously stood up with both hands smacking heavily onto the desk.

Bang..!!!

"...Huh?" And Adonis looked up at her confused. He was too tired to be shocked, so he just reacted slow, and lethargic.

"Ah, sorry, sorry... The nobles, or rather, humans in general, are opportunistic people. As long as you give them something that benefits them, they will not mind switching sides." Fiona said in excitement, explaining to him the sudden realization she just had.

Yet Adonis still failed to catch on.

"...True. But what can we give them? They are doing this on purpose to benefit off of us." He said, sighing once more in defeat. Yet...

Bam!!

Fiona smacked the table once more, almost startling the lethargic Adonis as she spoke, "We are domain lords. Not just uprising kings, but rulers of lands that even gods would envy. What can we give them? Hmph, what do you think?"

She scoffed as she looked down onto Adonis, whose thoughts weren't so active due to fatigue. But even then, even he suddenly understood.

They were domain lords.

They were king candidates.

There was definitely something they could offer, that would ensnare these greedy nobles. He thought, as Fiona continued with her words.

"We can strengthen people with our authority as domain lords. Not only that, we can also bestow Legendary Classes at will." She said, forcing Adonis to nod his head in agreement.

"True, true... but, the requirements are too high, aren't they?" He inquired, a bitter smile on his face. Yet Fiona had yet to give up.

True, to maintain the strengthening effect, they would have to supply 1,000 units of Mana per person, for every second.

Just a single individual would cost them almost a hundred million units of Mana per day. Let alone entire droves of them.

Then the Legendary Classes. As a for now, he only had ten slots available. Even when deducting one for Lanzelet, as he was confident he would win, they were still nine.

How many nobles were out there? How many of them had sons and promising warriors? Many. Many to count. And too many to satisfy.

Adonis thought as such, but Fiona? Fiona was raised by two cunning men, and a woman who fell for one of them.

She was not always as simple and as cute as she seems. Her thoughts sometimes raged.

"Hmph." She scoffed, as her eyes twinkled under the lamp's light. Yet unlike before, the light within was hiding a devious flame, "Simple. We just have to choose seven, no, five noble families, and use them as bait."

"Use them... as bait..?"

"Yes. Give them the benefits of being our followers, and then wait as the others fight to earn their positions. The stronger you become, the more slots you will have, and the more you can satisfy their demands." She said, her eyes now sparkling with joy.

Finally, a solution.

She beamed with happiness. And Adonis suddenly discovered a new side of this extremely pretty princess. 'How devious.' He thought, as his thoughts returned to today.

His Mana, after becoming a Master swordsman, finally exceeded eighty billion units.

A person could normally recover 0.1% of their energy reserves per second, thus meaning almost twenty minutes to recover to complete saturation. Only, and only if your Mana matched your Realm.

If you have more Mana than your extended Realm, it would require more time. Luckily, the higher one's potential was, the more they could recover their Mana per second.

'Lord Damien said I was talented enough to recover 1% of my Mana per second. And the total Mana reserves for a Grand Master are 250,000 units, meaning I can recover 2,500 units per second...' He froze, as his thoughts went down a path undesired.

With eighty billion units of Mana, it would take forever to recover even just a fraction of it.

'Luckily, being a domain lord for a Tier 3 domain, increased my recovery rate by three thousand as long as I'm within Avarice.' A smile crept up his face as his thoughts finally swam out of the undesired path.

At this rate, he could recover all his Mana in exactly three hours. And doing the calculations, maybe things might work out.

If using his authority to increase the strength of one person cost a thousand units of Mana per second. Then if he used it for three hours, that would be, 10,800,000 units of Mana per person.

If he chose five thousand people to support, that would be around fifty five billion Mana units in three hours. Which is far below what he could recover in three hours.

The cost of expenditure was below his recovery rate. He could manage.

Coming to such a conclusion, the young man nodded his head at Fiona's words. After waiting for so long, the young lady finally obtained a genuine response. "In that case, let's go with your idea. And start as soon as possible." He declared.

And Fiona nodded with a smile. "I knew you'd come around."

~~~

The next day.

The Silver mansion.

Damien walked through the hallway, as he headed towards the underground training room. Along the way, the new servants of the household would move out of the way, and lower their heads as he walked past.

"Good morning, lord Silver." They respectfully greeted him as he walked by each one of them.

"Mhm." And Damien hummed in acknowledgement of their greeting.

This charade continued on for a while longer, until he arrived at an entrance that led downwards, into what seemed like an abyss of never-ending stairs.

Thus in silence, Damien went down the stairs, until he managed to reach an underground training room. A place that was as large as their mansion, as it was as large as a soccer field.

It was mostly an open space ground, with four pillars at all cardinal directions, connecting the base floor with the ceiling, which so happened to be the base floor of the mansion.

At the center, sat an ethereal beauty with otherworldly charm. One seemingly at peace with her soroundings. "I honestly thought you wouldn't check up on me." She said, her eyes closed, with a smile on her face.

"I had to." Damien responded, as he casually walked towards the center of the training ground, where Juliette sat. "After all, a week should be more than enough for a bit of progress, right?" He added.

An inquiry that was rhetorical.

For he knew the answer to that.

And as he knew, Juliette did not bother responding to him. Instead, she smiled while opening her eyes.

"Time magic is a bit more complicated than I thought it would be. Let alone Space magic." She said, as if complaining. "And though I did not manage to attain any skills, I did get a glimpse at their meaning... unfortunately, I still need more time."

She concluded, as Damien finally arrived before her. He gently pressed his hand onto her head, then softly brushed it. "Mhm. You've done your best. Thanks." He said.

"Mhm~" And Juliette happily took those words to heart. 'Ah, being praised by my husband-to-be sure feels nice.' She thought.

"How much longer do you need?" Damien wondered.

"I'm not sure. Around three more weeks for both magic? Ah, but if I had something that has perhaps a high Affinity of both Space or Time, I could instantly comprehend both." She responded.

"Hmm..." And Damien thought about it.

Unfortunately, he does not remember much about any Space or Time related resources around here. So that would be hard.

"...I'll ask Adonis and Fiona, perhaps elder sister Anna too, to collect data on people with high ranked Classes. Perhaps one or two amongst them have Class Abilities with such attributes." He ultimately responded as such.